Collation/retrieval system, collation/retrieval server, image feature extraction apparatus, collation/retrieval method, and program

ABSTRACT

The present invention is a collation/retrieval system collating a product manufactured by or delivered from a producer or a distributor with a product to be collated comprising: a storage unit that stores an image feature of a predetermined collation area of the product determined in advance at a position relative to a reference section common in every product; a to-be-collated product feature extraction unit that receives an image of the product to be collated and detecting the reference section of the product from the received image to extract an image feature of the collation area determined by reference to the reference section; and a collation unit that collates the stored image feature with the image feature of the collation area of the product to be collated.

TECHNICAL FIELD

The present invention relates to a collation/retrieval system, acollation/retrieval server, an image feature extraction apparatus, acollation/retrieval method, and a program.

BACKGROUND ART

In recent years, commitment to quality of products comes to be strongeramong consumers and retailers. However, there was no means for theconsumers and the retailers to know whether or not the products arrivedat stores are genuine or whether or not the products they received arefrom authorized agents.

In other words, in the conventional system for distributing products,many middlemen (e.g., several wholesale stores) exist between theproducers and consumers. Such conventional system, in which manymiddlemen exist between the producers and consumers, makes it difficultto provide the consumers accurate information about each individualproduct (e.g., information about a producing area, a producer name, akind, a production date, and quality of the each individual product)when the products arrives at the consumers.

As the typical product management system, an information acquisitionsystem acquiring individual information of each farm product has beenproposed. The system enables easy providing of the individualinformation of each farm product to, for example, the consumers (e.g.,Patent Document 1).

Patent document 1 discloses such a technique in which an ID number as anown identifier for each individual is given to a farm product such as amelon, resulting in allowing a person (e.g., a consumer) other than thefarm producer of the melon (e.g., a commercial farm or an agriculturalcooperative) to freely acquire individual information about the melonbased on the ID number. For the sake of executing the above system, alabel (e.g., a seal or a sticker) with the ID number is attached to thefarm product.

Further, the individual information about the farm product isaccumulated in a computer system of a separately provided independentneutral organization (e.g., a database company) together with the IDnumber, resulting in assembling a database. The producer transmits theID number to the computer system as well as transmits the individualinformation, corresponding to the farm product, including a producingarea, a producer name, a kind, a cultivation method, a harvest date, andquality (e.g., sugar content) of the farm product, to the computersystem.

At least one computer is provided to each retailer shop and eachconsumer's home. Each computer is connected to the computer system viathe general public line in a mutually communicative manner. The retailershop or the consumer transmits the ID number on the label attached tothe farm product to the computer system from the computer of his own.This enables the retailer shop or the consumer to acquire the individualinformation about the farm product identified by the ID number.

For controlling agricultural and marine products stocked by adistributor, it is necessary to know information to be identified (e.g.,quality information about an arrival date and a harvest date effectingon freshness and a component different according to a process purpose)in the stock control of each stock product. With the information, forexample, stock products having elder arrival date are sold by loweringthe price prior to stock products of the same kind having newer arrivaldate. Conventionally, similarly to the above described technique,attachment of the label with the ID number to the farm product allowsthe computer system to retrieve stock control information based on theID number.

RELATED ART DOCUMENTS Patent Documents

[Patent Document 1]

-   Japanese Patent No. 3355366

SUMMARY OF INVENTION Technical Problem

However, in the method as disclosed in patent document 1 in which anindividual is identified by a label (e.g., a seal or a sticker) attachedto a product or by a packaging material of the product, if the label(hereinafter the “label” includes a packaging material) is removedmaliciously or if the label is copied and/or imitated to be attached toanother similar product, it was hard or impossible to prevent a fraud,for example, on a consignor of the product.

Further, when the label could not be attached to the product or when thelabel was detached from the product, it became impossible to retrievestock control information of such each individual.

Still further, in the case where the producer or the retailer holds aplurality of products of the same kind, the producer or the retailerneeds to provide a serial number for each product and attach a label ora tag capable of reading the serial number to each product in order toretrieve information of each individual for the purpose of management ofthe consignees and control of the stock adjustment one by one in aseparate manner. This requires more cost than a case of using a singlepiece of label or a printing.

Yet further, in some products, e.g., minute parts and food products, itis impossible to directly write onto the products or attach a label or atag to the products. Also, in other products, since a unit price isinexpensive, it is a burden to prepare different tags to each individualin view of an economical aspect. As a result, it was impossible to usesuch a system of patent document 1 in which the label (e.g., the seal orthe sticker) is attached to each product. Thus, none of the producers,the distributors, the retailers, or the consumers had a means capable ofsuitably control each product separately.

In a case of performing acceptance quality sampling in a factory, e.g.,in a case of retrieving to which lot does a product belong, it wasdifficult to provide accurate information about each of the products ofthe same kind (e.g., to provide information different between productseven of the same kind, e.g., information about a time of manufacture, aproduction worker, and manufacturing process) among a vast amount ofproducts. This makes it difficult to identify and manage the productsone by one.

Instead of the attachment of a label, embedding of, for example, an ICtag in the product is proposed as one means. However, this damages theproduct and therefore lowers a value of commodity in a case of anindustrial product such as a leather product or a hard disk. Further,there was such a problem that the use of IC tag made the whole systemexpensive.

The present invention was made to solve the above described problems. Apurpose of the present invention is to provide a collation/retrievalsystem capable of collating and retrieving information about eachindividual product without requiring any specific device such as an ICtag, a collation/retrieval server, an image feature extractionapparatus, a collation/retrieval method, and a program.

Means for Solving the Problems

The present invention is directed to a collation/retrieval systemincluding a first imaging means capturing an image including at least areference section common in every product and a predetermined collationarea of the product determined in advance at a position relative to thereference section, a product feature extraction means detecting thereference section from the image captured by the first imaging means toextract an image feature of the collation area determined by referenceto the detected reference section, a storage means storing the extractedimage feature of the collation area of the product, a second imagingmeans capturing an image including at least the reference section of aproduct to be collated and the predetermined collation area of theproduct to be collated determined by reference to the reference section,a to-be-collated product feature extraction means detecting, from theimage captured by the second imaging means, the reference section of theproduct to be collated to extract an image feature of the collation areadetermined by reference to the reference section, and acollation/retrieval means collating the stored image feature with theimage feature of the collation area of the product to be collated.

The present invention is directed to a collation/retrieval servercollating a product produced by or delivered from a producer or adistributor with a product to be collated including a storage meansstoring an image feature of a predetermined collation area of theproduct determined in advance at a position relative to a referencesection common in every product, a to-be-collated product featureextraction means receiving an image of the product to be collated,detecting the reference section of the product to be collated from thereceived image, and extracting an image feature of the collation areadetermined by reference to the reference section, and a collation meanscollating the stored image feature with the image feature of thecollation area of the product to be collated.

The present invention is directed to an image feature extractionapparatus including a feature extraction means detecting a referencesection common in every product from an image of a product produced byor delivered from a producer or a distributor and an image of a productto be collated to extract an image feature of a collation areadetermined in advance at a position relative to the detected referencesection.

The present invention is directed to a collation/retrieval methodincluding setting a predetermined section formed into the same patternfor every product to a reference section, setting an area existing at astandard position relative to the reference section to a collation area,and using an image feature in the collation area of the product incollation/retrieval of a product.

The present invention is directed to a program causing a computer todetect, from an image of a product produced by or delivered from aproducer or a distributor and an image of a product to be collated, areference section common in every product to extract an image feature ofa collation area determined in advance at a position relative to thedetected reference section.

The present invention is directed to a collation unit including afeature extraction means detecting, from an image of a product producedby or delivered from a producer or a distributor and an image of aproduct to be collated, a reference section common in every product toextract an image feature of a collation area determined in advance at aposition relative to the detected reference section, and a collationmeans collating an image feature stored in advance with the imagefeature of the collation area of the product to be collated.

Effects of the Invention

The present invention is capable of executing, without using anyspecific device such as an IC tag, collation for the purpose ofauthenticity determination of a product or retrieval of managementinformation different for each individual among products of the samekind.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF DRAWINGS

FIG. 1 is a block diagram according to an embodiment of the presentinvention.

FIG. 2 illustrates a collation area.

FIG. 3 illustrates another collation area.

FIG. 4 is a block diagram of a management information retrieval systemaccording to the embodiment.

FIG. 5 illustrates a terminal device for retrieving managementinformation.

DESCRIPTION OF EMBODIMENTS

Embodiments of the present invention will be described below.

FIG. 1 is a block diagram according to an embodiment of the presentinvention.

According to an aspect of the embodiment of the present invention, aproduct collation/retrieval system includes an imaging unit 1 capturingan image including at least a reference section common in every productand a predetermined collation area of the product determined in advanceat a position relative to the reference section, a product featureextraction unit 2 detecting the reference section from the imagecaptured by the imaging unit 1 to extract an image feature of thecollation area determined by reference to the detected referencesection, a storage unit 3 storing the extracted image feature of thecollation area of the product, an imaging unit 4 capturing an imageincluding at least the reference section of a product to be collated andthe predetermined collation area of the product to be collateddetermined by reference to the reference section, a to-be-collatedproduct feature extraction unit 5 detecting the reference section of theproduct to be collated from the image captured by the imaging unit 4 toextract an image feature of the collation area determined by referenceto the reference section, and a collation/retrieval unit 6 collating theimage feature stored in the storage unit 3 with the image feature of thecollation area of the product to be collated.

According to the present invention, the collation/retrieval of a productis performed based on a minute difference of a surface pattern of theindividual product. Meanwhile, the product to which the presentinvention is applied is not limited to anything as far as the eachindividual product includes a different pattern on the surface thereof.Specific examples of the product include, for example, a leatherproduct, a metal workpiece, molten resin, and an industrial productincluding a ceramic portion (e.g., a semiconductor chip). Examples ofthe surface pattern of the product include a surface design of theleather product and a minute uniformity of the molten resin and theceramic portion.

Here, the general idea of the producer or the distributor includes aperson engaged in production (i.e., a production company of anindustrial product) and a person engaged in distribution or qualitycontrol of products during the distribution of the products (e.g., awholesaler, a retail shop, and an agent).

Here, the reference section of the product means a trademark, alogotype, a name of manufacturer, a manufacturing company, a brand name,a product name, and a product number attached to, printed, stamped,branded on a product. The reference sections of the products of the samekind commonly have the same pattern and have a characteristicappearance. The positions and the postures of the reference sections ofthe products are defined as reference standards. Features thereof arestored in the product feature extraction unit 2 and the to-be-collatedproduct feature extraction unit 5. Meanwhile, the reference section isnot needed to be changed for each individual. Therefore, a cost can besaved comparing to the conventional means in which different identifier,e.g., different management tag, is provided to the each individual.

Here, the collation area means a partial area on the surface of theproduct determined in advance at a position relative to the referencesection for the purpose of collation with respect to the product. Thecollation area is set to a position relative to a trademark, a logotype,a name of manufacturer, a manufacturing company, a brand name, a productname, and a product number (i.e., the reference section) attached to,printed, stamped, or branded on the product. For example, in the casewhere the product is a leather wallet, as shown in FIG. 2, the collationarea 11 is defined as follows. First, a top of a top portion of a letter“A” of a logotype 10 stamped on the wallet is determined as a reference.A position X-cm away from the top upwardly by 30 degrees is determinedas an upper right top of the collation area 11. A rectangular areadefined by a Y-cm length diagonal line extending downwardly by 30degrees from the upper right top is set to the collation area 11. Thesetting of the collation area 11 in a manner as described above enablessecure identification of the collation area 11 at a position relative tothe logotype 10 since normally the same logotype 10 is used.

This is a mere example and, thus, should not be construed in a limitingsense. For example, a vertically and horizontally multiplied range ofthe logotype 10 can be set as the collation area. Alternatively, thecollation area can be defined at a position below the logotype 10.Designation of the position and the range of the collation area by arelative value determined by reference to a size of the logotype enablescorrection of a position and an orientation of an object when an imageof the object is captured and a distance to an image capturing meansbased on a size and a shape of the known logotype.

FIG. 3 shows another example. FIG. 3 exemplifies a metal product such asa hard disk. In a case of FIG. 3, a collation area 13 is set to aposition away from a label 12 by reference to the label attached to thehard disk. Even the metal product such as a hard disk includes a minuteuniformity on the surface thereof. That is, the metal products differone by one. Therefore, the minute uniformity on the surface of thecollation area determined by reference to the label also differs foreach individual. This enables collation of each individual.

Even when the collation area 13 is positioned away from the label 12,detection of the label 12 enables detection of the collation area 13 ata position relative to the position of the label 12. The collation area13 can be easily detected by the following manner. For example, aposition X-cm away from a lower left top as a reference position of thelabel 12 downwardly by 45 degrees is set to an upper right top of thecollation area 11 and a rectangular area defined by a diagonal linehaving Y-cm length extending downwardly by 45 degrees from the upperright top is set to the collation area 13. This facilitates detection ofthe collation area 13.

Next, a structure of each unit will be described below.

The imaging unit 1 belongs to a parson engaged in production (e.g., anindustrial product manufacturer) and a parson managing distribution ofproducts and a quality control during the course of distribution. Forexample, the producer captures an image of the reference section and animage of the collation area of the products by using the imaging unit 1.The imaging unit 1 may be equipped with a specific device in order tocapture the image of the collation area of the product. The specificdevice may be a digital camera with a CCD or a CMOS or a cellular phone.A file format of the captured image may be anything. For example, thefile format may be a JPEG.

The product feature extraction unit 2 detects the reference section fromthe image captured by the imaging unit 1 to extract an image feature ofthe collation area determined by reference to the reference section. Theproduct feature extraction unit 2 stores in advance a feature of thereference section of the product and, based on the feature, thereference section is detected from the image captured by the imagingunit 1. At the time, the product feature extraction unit 2 normalizesthe collation area determined in advance by reference to the referencesection based on the position and the posture of the reference sectionon the image to extract the image feature of the normalized collationarea. Extraction of the image feature can be performed by an extractiontechnique in which the image feature of a fingerprint is extracted byusing a brightness value, a feature point, an inflection point of a lineof a binarized image, an intersection point, an end point, and a centerpoint of the image. The image features of a plurality of products thusextracted are stored in the storage unit 3. The products recorded (i.e.,registered) in the recording unit 3 are hereinafter referred to asregistered products.

Further, it is possible to store the image feature of the registeredproduct after the image feature thereof is associated with manufacturinginformation including a factory name, a producer name, a lot number, aproduction date, and a quality information, and management informationincluding a shipping point and a ship date of the product. This enablesacquisition of also management information of the collated product.

The imaging unit 4 and the to-be-collated product feature extractionunit 5 belong to a side of collating the product such as a retail shop,a distribution manager, and a consumer. The imaging unit 4 and theto-be-collated product feature extraction unit 5 are configuredsimilarly to the imaging unit 1 and the product feature extraction unit2, respectively.

A collation/retrieval unit 6 collates the image feature of the collationarea of the product to be collated, extracted by the to-be-collatedproduct feature extraction unit 5, with the image feature of thecollation area of the registered product stored in the storage unit 3.As a result, if a matching point is found therebetween, thecollation/retrieval unit 6 determines that the product to be collatedhas already been registered. Here, collation of the image feature isperformed in the following manner. For example, considering an endpoint, an intersection point, and corners of the line of the surfacepattern as the feature points, an arrangement of the feature points arecollated. If the number of arrangements of the feature points at thesame position (i.e., in a range under a certain threshold) is equal toor more than a predetermined number, the collation/retrieval unit 6considers as the same product. Such collation technology can employ theknown fingerprint matching technology.

As described above, according to this embodiment, a collationdetermination of the product can be performed without use of a specifictag. At the same, distribution of the product duly delivered from theproducer and/or the distributor of the product can be controlled. As aresult, fraud on the product such as an evil replacement of the productcan be eliminated or reduced.

If the manufacturing information including a production site, a factoryname, a producer name, a lot number, a production date, and a qualityinformation of the product, and the management information including ashipping point and a ship date of the product are associated with theimage feature of the product in a corresponding manner to be stored, forexample, the management information corresponding to the image featurematched during the collating/retrieving can be output together with thecollation result. As a result, the consumer can acquire the managementinformation of the product.

The management information retrieval system using the collation systemaccording to the above described embodiment will be described below. Themanagement information retrieval system of this embodiment is made tosatisfy a demand for retrieving management information about a lotnumber of the product and a line number of the production site in thecase where the system extracts a product from many products to perform aquality test of the product in a manner similar to the acceptancesampling of the factory.

FIG. 4 is a block diagram of the embodiment of the managementinformation retrieval system.

As shown in FIG. 4, the management information retrieval system includesa feature extraction apparatus 100 belonging to a side of a leatherwallet manufacturer, a collation/retrieval server 200 performingcollation, and a collation device 300 belonging to a side of the qualitycontrol authority.

The image feature extraction apparatus 100 includes an imaging unit 101,a product feature extraction unit 102, and a transmission unit 103. Theimaging unit 101 and the product feature extraction unit 102 areconfigured similarly to the above described imaging unit 1 and theproduct feature extraction unit 2, respectively. The transmission unit103 transmits the image feature of the collation area of the walletextracted by the product feature extraction unit 102 and the managementinformation (including a production site, a producer name, a lot number,a production date, and quality information) for the collation thereof.

A collation server 200 includes a database 201, a to-be-retrievedproduct feature extraction unit 202, and a collation/retrieval unit 203.The to-be-retrieved product feature extraction unit 202 and thecollation/retrieval unit 203 are configured similarly to the abovedescribed to-be-collated product feature extraction unit 5 and thecollation/retrieval unit 6, respectively. The database 201 stores theimage feature of the collation area of each wallet of the products,i.e., of the wallets, of the same kind transmitted from the imagefeature extraction apparatus 100 belonging to the side of the producerafter the image feature is associated with the management information ofthe wallet.

A collation device 300 includes an imaging unit 301 and a transmissionand reception unit 302. The imaging unit 301 is configured similarly tothe above described imaging unit 4. The transmission unit 302 transmitsan image of the wallet captured by the imaging unit 301 to the collationserver 200. Also, the transmission unit 302 receives a retrieval resultfrom the collation server 200.

Now, an operation of the above described configuration will be describedbelow.

First, a registration operation of the image feature of the surfacedesign of the wallet will be described.

The producer registers in advance the image feature of the logotype 10stamped on the wallet as shown in FIG. 2 and the position of thecollation area by reference to the logotype 10 in the product featureextraction unit 102. Then, the producer captures an image of thelogotype 10 and an image of the surface of the wallet including thecollation area determined by reference to the logotype 10 by the imagingunit 101.

The product feature extraction unit 102 detects the label 10 from thecaptured image of the wallet and extracts the image feature of thesurface design of the collation area determined by reference to thedetected label 10. At this time, the product feature extraction unit 102normalizes the collation area determined in advance by reference to thelogotype 10 based on the position and the posture of the logotype 10 onthe image to extract the image feature of the normalized collation area.

The producer inputs the management information (e.g., information abouta production site, a producer name, a lot number, a production date, andquality information) of the wallet thus captured into the image featureextraction apparatus 100. Then, the transmission unit 103 transmits theimage feature of the wallet and the management information of the walletto the collation server 200. This processing is repeated for the numberof products the producer desires to register.

In the collation server 200, the image feature of the wallet and themanagement information of the wallet from the image feature extractionapparatus 100 belonging to the producer are registered in the database201.

Now, an operation of the retrieval processing will be described below.

An administrator captures an image of the surface of the walletcorresponding to the collation area including the logotype 10 by theimaging unit 301 of the collation device 300 in order to perform thecollation of a wallet to be collated. The captured image is transmittedto the collation server 200 by the transmission and reception unit 302.

A to-be-collated product feature extraction apparatus 202 of thecollation server 200 detects the logotype 10 of the wallet to becollated from the received image by a method similar to the abovedescribed one to extract an image feature of the surface design of thecollation area from the detected logotype 10. Then, the to-be-collatedproduct feature extraction apparatus outputs the extracted image featureto the collation/retrieval unit 203.

In the collation/retrieval unit 203, an image feature having the highestsimilarity to the received image feature of the product to be retrievedis retrieved from the image features registered in the database 201.Then, the collation/retrieval unit 203 reads out the managementinformation associated with the image feature to transmit the same tothe collation device 300. Here, the collation/retrieval unit 203 is notconfigured such that the image feature having the similarity more than apredetermined threshold is retrieved in order to perform the collationsuch as the authenticity determination, but is configured such that theimage feature having the highest similarity to the image feature of theproduct to be retrieved is retrieved from the image features registeredin the database 201. This is because, during the quality test, a fakeproduct is least likely to be contaminated. In other words, theauthenticity determination processing that strictly checks the possiblefake product against a genuine product is not needed here.

The collation device 300 receives the management information from thecollation server 200 and notifies the received management information tothe administrator.

According to this embodiment, as described above, even without specificequipment, the administrator can retrieve the management information ofa specific product among a lot of products.

Meanwhile, in the above described embodiment, the product featureextraction unit 102 initially extracting the image feature of theproduct has been illustrated as being disposed on the device belongingto the producer. It is also possible for the to-be-retrieved productfeature extraction unit 202 to share the roll. In this case, the imageof the collation area of the product is transmitted from the side of theproducer.

Further, the above described embodiment has been illustrated asperforming the collation processing by the collation server 200 from theside of the administrator via communication. It is also possible to download in advance features and management information of a plurality ofregistered products from a database, e.g., the database 201 registeringthe image of the surface design and management information of theproduct to perform the retrieval processing without using thecommunication. Such management information retrieval apparatus includes,as shown in FIG. 5, a storage unit 300 storing the image feature of thesurface design and the management information of the registered productregistered by, for example, the producer, the imaging unit 301, theto-be-retrieved product feature extraction unit 302, acollation/retrieval unit 303, and a display unit 304. The imaging unit301, the to-be-retrieved product feature extraction unit 302, and thecollation/retrieval unit 303 are configured similarly to the abovedescribed imaging unit, the to-be-retrieved product feature extractionunit, and the collation/retrieval unit 303, respectively. The displayunit 304 displays, for example, the management information of thecollation/retrieval unit 303.

As it is obvious from the above description, it is also possible thatthe feature extraction apparatus and the collation/retrieval unitinclude hardware. Alternatively, it is also possible that the featureextraction apparatus and the collation/retrieval unit include computerprogram. In this case, a processor executed by a program stored in aprogram memory executes a function and an operation similar to those ofthe above described embodiment and examples.

The above described embodiment may be partially or entirely described asin the below described Supplementary note. This, however, should not beconstrued in a limiting sense.

(Supplementary note 1) A collation/retrieval system including

a first imaging means capturing an image including at least a referencesection common in every product and a predetermined collation area ofthe product determined in advance at a position relative to thereference section,

a product feature extraction means detecting the reference section fromthe image captured by the first imaging means and extracting an imagefeature of the collation area determined by reference to the detectedreference section,

a storage means storing the extracted image feature of the collationarea of the product,

a second imaging means capturing an image including at least thereference section of a product to be collated and the predeterminedcollation area of the product determined by reference to the referencesection,

a to-be-collated product feature extraction means detecting thereference section of the product to be collated from the image capturedby the second imaging means and extracting an image feature of thecollation area determined by reference to the reference section, and

a collation/retrieval means collating the stored image feature with theimage feature of the collation area of the product to be collated.

(Supplementary note 2) The collation/retrieval system according to theSupplementary note 1, wherein the reference section includes atrademark, a logotype, a name of manufacturer, a manufacturing company,a brand name, a product name, and a product number attached to, printed,stamped, or branded on the product.

(Supplementary note 3) The collation/retrieval system according to theSupplementary note 1 or the Supplementary note 2, wherein the productfeature extraction means and the to-be-collated product featureextraction means each store in advance the feature of the referencesection and the position of the collation area determined by referenceto the reference section, detect the predetermined section of theproduct from the captured image based on the feature of thepredetermined section, and normalize the position and a size of thecollation area by referring to the detected predetermined section toextract an image feature of the collation area.

(Supplementary note 4) The collation/retrieval system according to anyone of Supplementary note 1 to Supplementary note 3, wherein the productis an industrial product including a leather product, a metal workpiece,a molten resin, and/or a ceramic portion.

(Supplementary note 5) The collation/retrieval system according to anyone of Supplementary note 1 to Supplementary note 4,

wherein the storage means stores a plurality of image features ofcollation areas extracted from a plurality of products to be retrievedand management information corresponding to the plurality of products tobe retrieved in a mutually associated manner; and

wherein the collation/retrieval means retrieves an image feature havingthe highest similarity to the image features of the collation areas ofthe plurality of products to be retrieved from the stored plurality ofimage features to output management information of a productcorresponding to the image feature having the highest similarity.

(Supplementary note 6) A collation/retrieval server collating a productmanufactured by or delivered from a producer or a distributor with aproduct to be collated including

a storage means storing an image feature of a predetermined collationarea of the product determined in advance at a position relative to areference section common in every product,

a to-be-collated product feature extraction means receiving an image ofthe product to be collated, detecting the reference section of theproduct to be collated from the received image, and extracting an imagefeature of the collation area determined by reference to the referencesection and

a collation means collating the stored image feature with the imagefeature of the collation area of the product to be collated.

(Supplementary note 7) The collation/retrieval server according toSupplementary note 6, further including a product feature extractionmeans receiving an image of a product manufactured by or delivered froma producer or a distributor, detecting the reference section of theproduct from the received image, and extracting the image feature of thecollation area determined by reference to the reference section toregister the extracted image feature of the collation area in thestorage means.

(Supplementary note 8) The collation/retrieval server according toSupplementary note 6 or Supplementary note 7, wherein the productfeature extraction means and the to-be-collated product featureextraction means each store in advance the feature of the referencesection and the position of the collation area determined by referenceto the reference section, detect the predetermined section of theproduct from the captured image based on the feature of thepredetermined section, and normalize the position and a size of thecollation area by referring to the detected predetermined section toextract the image feature of the collation area.

(Supplementary note 9) The collation/retrieval server according to anyone of Supplementary note 6 to Supplementary note 8,

wherein the storage means stores a plurality of image features ofcollation areas extracted from a plurality of products to be retrievedand management information corresponding to the plurality of products tobe retrieved in a mutually associated manner; and

wherein the collation/retrieval means retrieves an image feature havingthe highest similarity to the image features of the collation areas ofthe plurality of products to be collated from the stored plurality ofimage features to output management information of a productcorresponding to the image feature having the highest similarity.

(Supplementary note 10) An image feature extraction apparatus includinga feature extraction means detecting a reference section common in everyproduct from an image of a product manufactured by or delivered from aproducer or a distributor and an image of a product to be collated toextract an image feature of a collation area determined in advance at aposition relative to the detected reference section.

(Supplementary note 11) The image feature extraction apparatus accordingto Supplementary note 10, wherein the feature extraction means stores inadvance a feature of the reference section and a position of thecollation area determined by reference to the reference section, detectsthe predetermined section of the product from the captured image basedon the feature of the predetermined section, and normalizes the positionand a size of the collation area by referring to the detectedpredetermined section to extract the image feature of the collationarea.

(Supplementary note 12) The image feature extraction apparatus accordingto Supplementary note 10 or Supplementary note 11, further including atransmission means transmitting the image feature of the collation areato a collation server.

(Supplementary note 13) A collation/retrieval method including

setting a predetermined section of a product formed into the samepattern to a reference section,

setting an area existing at a standard position relative to thereference section to a collation area, and

using an image feature in the collation area of the product forcollation and retrieval of the product.

(Supplementary note 14) The collation/retrieval method according toSupplementary note 13 further including

capturing an image including at least the reference section common inevery product and the predetermined collation area of the productdetermined in advance at a position relative to the reference section,

detecting the reference section from the captured image to extract theimage feature of the collation area determined by reference to thedetected reference section,

storing the extracted image feature of the collation area of theproduct,

capturing an image including at least the reference section of theproduct to be collated and the predetermined collation area of theproduct determined by reference to the reference section,

detecting the reference section of the product to be collated from thecaptured image to extract the image feature of the collation areadetermined by reference to the reference section, and

collating the stored image feature with the image feature of thecollation area of the product to be collated.

(Supplementary note 15) The collation/retrieval method according toSupplementary note 13 or Supplementary note 14, wherein the referencesection includes a trademark, a logotype, a name of manufacturer, amanufacturing company, a brand name, a product name, and a productnumber attached to, printed, stamped, or branded on the product.

(Supplementary note 16) The collation/retrieval method according toSupplementary note 13 or Supplementary note 15, wherein the extractionof the image feature includes

storing in advance the feature of the reference section and the positionof the collation area determined by reference to the reference section,

detecting the predetermined section of the product from the capturedimage based on the feature of the predetermined section, and

normalizing the position and a size of the collation area by referringto the detected predetermined section to extract the image feature ofthe collation area.

(Supplementary note 17) The collation/retrieval method according to anyone of Supplementary note 13 to Supplementary note 16 includes

storing a plurality of image features of collation areas extracted froma plurality of products to be retrieved and management informationcorresponding to the plurality of products to be retrieved in a mutuallyassociated manner, and

retrieving an image feature having the highest similarity to the imagefeatures of the collation areas of the plurality of products to beretrieved from the stored plurality of image features to outputmanagement information of a product corresponding to the image featurehaving the highest similarity.

(Supplementary note 18) The collation/retrieval method according to anyone of Supplementary note 13 to Supplementary note 17, wherein theproduct is an industrial product including a leather product, a metalworkpiece, a molten resin, and/or a ceramic portion.

(Supplementary note 19) A program causing a computer to detect areference section common in every product from an image of a productmanufactured by or delivered from a producer or a distributor and animage of a product to be collated to extract an image feature of acollation area determined in advance at a position relative to thedetected reference section.

(Supplementary note 20) The program according to Supplementary note 19causing the computer to execute collation processing in which the imagefeature of the collation area of the product to be collated is collatedwith a preliminary stored image feature of the collation area of theproduct.

(Supplementary note 21) The program according to Supplementary note 18or Supplementary note 19 causing the computer to execute outputprocessing in which, from a database in which a plurality of imagefeatures of the collation areas extracted from a plurality of productsto be retrieved and management information corresponding to theplurality of products to be retrieved are stored in a mutuallyassociated manner, an image feature having the highest similarity to theimage features of collation areas of the products to be collated isretrieved from the stored plurality of image features to outputmanagement information of a product corresponding to the image featurehaving the highest similarity.

(Supplementary note 22) A collation unit including

a feature extraction means detecting, from an image of a productmanufactured by or delivered from a producer or a distributor and animage of a product to be collated, a reference section common in everyproduct to extract an image feature of a collation area determined inadvance at a position relative to the detected reference section, and

a collation means collating a preliminary stored image feature with theimage feature of the collation area of the product to be collated.

Hereinabove, the present invention has been illustrated by preferredembodiments and examples. It is noted that the present invention is notlimited to the above described embodiments and examples, and variousmodifications are possible without departing from the technical scope ofthe present disclosure.

This application claims the benefit of Japanese Patent Application No.2011-166789 filed Jul. 29, 2011, the disclosure of which is herebyincorporated by reference.

DESCRIPTION OF THE REFERENCE NUMERAL

-   1 Imaging unit-   2 Product feature extraction unit-   3 Storage unit-   4 Imaging unit-   5 To-be-collated product feature extraction unit-   6 Collation/retrieval unit

1. (canceled)
 2. (canceled)
 3. (canceled)
 4. (canceled)
 5. (canceled)
 6. A collation/retrieval system collating a product manufactured by or delivered from a producer or a distributor with a product to be collated comprising: a storage unit that stores an image feature of a predetermined collation area of the product determined in advance at a position relative to a reference section common in every product; a to-be-collated product feature extraction unit that receives an image of the product to be collated, detects the reference section of the product from the received image and extracts an image feature of the collation area determined by reference to the reference section; and a collation unit that collates the stored image feature with the image feature of the collation area of the product to be collated.
 7. The collation/retrieval system according to claim 6, further comprising: a product feature extraction unit that receives an image of a product manufactured by or delivered from a producer or a distributor, detects the reference section of the product from the received image, and extracts the image feature of the collation area determined by reference to the reference section to register the extracted image feature of the collation area in the storage unit.
 8. The collation/retrieval system according to claim 6, wherein the product feature extraction unit and the to-be-collated product feature extraction unit each store in advance the feature of the reference section and the position of the collation area determined by reference to the reference section, detect the predetermined section of the product from the captured image based on the feature of the predetermined section, and normalize the position and a size of the collation area by referring to the detected predetermined section to extract the image feature of the collation area.
 9. The collation/retrieval system according to claim 6, wherein the storage unit stores a plurality of image features of collation areas extracted from a plurality of products to be retrieved and management information corresponding to the plurality of products to be retrieved in a mutually associated manner; and wherein the collation/retrieval unit retrieves an image feature having the highest similarity to the image features of the collation areas of the plurality of products to be collated from the stored plurality of image features to output management information of a product corresponding to the image feature having the highest similarity.
 10. An image feature extraction apparatus comprising a feature extraction unit that detects a reference section common in every product from an image of a product manufactured by or delivered from a producer or a distributor and an image of a product to be collated to extract an image feature of a collation area determined in advance at a position relative to the detected reference section.
 11. The image feature extraction apparatus according to claim 10, wherein the feature extraction unit stores in advance a feature of the reference section and a position of the collation area determined by reference to the reference section, detects the predetermined section of the product from the captured image based on the feature of the predetermined section, and normalizes the position and a size of the collation area by referring to the detected predetermined section to extract the image feature of the collation area.
 12. The image feature extraction apparatus according to claim 10, further comprising: a transmission unit that transmits the image feature of the collation area to a collation server.
 13. A collation/retrieval method comprising: setting a predetermined section of a product formed into the same pattern to a reference section; setting an area existing at a standard position relative to the reference section to a collation area; and using an image feature in the collation area of the product for collation and retrieval of the product.
 14. The collation/retrieval method according to claim 13 comprising: capturing an image comprising at least the reference section common in every product and the predetermined collation area of the product determined in advance at a position relative to the reference section; detecting the reference section from the captured image to extract the image feature of the collation area determined by reference to the detected reference section; storing the extracted image feature of the collation area of the product; capturing an image comprising at least the reference section of the product to be collated and the predetermined collation area of the product determined by reference to the reference section; detecting the reference section of the product to be collated from the captured image to extract the image feature of the collation area determined by reference to the reference section; and collating the stored image feature with the image feature of the collation area of the product to be collated.
 15. The collation/retrieval method according to claim 13, wherein the reference section comprises a trademark, a logotype, a name of manufacturer, a manufacturing company, a brand name, a product name, and a product number attached to, printed, stamped, or branded on the product.
 16. The collation/retrieval method according to claim 13, wherein the extraction of the image feature comprises; storing in advance the feature of the reference section and the position of the collation area determined by reference to the reference section, detecting the predetermined section of the product from the captured image based on the feature of the predetermined section, and normalizing the position and a size of the collation area by referring to the detected predetermined section to extract the image feature of the collation area.
 17. The collation/retrieval method according to claim 13 comprising: storing a plurality of image features of collation areas extracted from a plurality of products to be retrieved and management information corresponding to the plurality of products to be retrieved in a mutually associated manner, and retrieving an image feature having the highest similarity to the image features of the collation areas of the plurality of products to be retrieved from the stored plurality of image features to output management information of a product corresponding to the image feature having the highest similarity.
 18. The collation/retrieval method according to claim 13, wherein the product is an industrial product comprising a leather product, a metal workpiece, a molten resin, and/or a ceramic portion.
 19. (canceled)
 20. (canceled)
 21. (canceled)
 22. (canceled) 